Writes Kimberley Strassel, in "The Them-vs.-Us Election" (Wall Street Journal).
January 19, 2024
"Nearly 50% of elites believe the U.S. provides 'too much individual freedom' — compared with nearly 60% of voters who believe there is too much 'government control.'"
"Seventy-seven percent of elites support 'strict rationing of gas, meat, and electricity' to fight climate change, vs. 28% of everyone else. More than two-thirds of elite Ivy graduates favor banning things like gasoline-powered cars and stoves and inessential air travel in the name of the environment. More than 70% of average voters say they'd be unwilling to pay more than $100 a year in taxes or costs for climate -- compared with 70% of elites who said they'd pay from $250 up to 'whatever it takes.'... While this elite is small, its members are prominent in every major institution of American power, from media to universities to government to Wall Street, and have become more intent on imposing their agenda from above. Many American voters feel helplessly under assault from policies that ignore their situation or values."
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"Too much individual freedom"
Dear Globalist Archons,
I’d make a really shitty slave. Best to just leave me alone.
Truly ROFLing and Sincerely Yours No Fingers Crossed or Nothin’,
RideSpaceMountain
"Elite" is just a nice way to say "moron".
The Putin-esque Elites count the votes.
"Too much individual freedom?"
Hah! That's the magic sauce.
Consider,
It wasn’t what government did that made America great; it was what government was prevented from doing that made the difference,
What set America apart from all other lands was freedom - for the individual. Freedom to work, to produce, to succeed and, especially, to keep the fruits of one’s labor.
America became great precisely because the stifling effects of too much government had been prevented.
However freedom in America was not totally unrestrained. Americans overwhelming chose to limit their actions with moral codes such as the Ten Commandments. Personal morality and limited government is the combination that characterized America and made it the envy of the world.
-----
The foregoing is part of the Narration from Overview of America, a 30-minute video of the John Birch Society which explains what made America great (answer, limited government) and why we today are suffering so much insanity (answer, too much government). If our Constitution were followed as written, fedgov would be 5% its present size.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIl57cchRqs
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is what's wrong with this country.
Who made these so-called "elites" the rulers of the United States? We have a democracy.
Last night I faced - again - the cold and hard reality of Net Zero. Omaha Public Power District nearly had a forced blackout this week because of too much reliance on solar and wind. But the Board went ahead and approved the borrowing of $819m to build more solar and wind.
I again told the Board that there is a study that models forced blackouts in WI and MN if net zero continues. The Canadian province of Alberta nearly had a forced blackout last week. They did have a blackout in HI. The common thread is too much wind and solar.
I flat out told them that people are going to die if they continue with Net Zero. But they rationalize it. This is cognitive dissonance at its finest. I firmly believe that thousands of Americans will have to die before this Net Zero craziness is stopped.
The Board ignores me. The Chairman refuses to look me in the eye. What a fucking weasel and useful idiot.
Elite has acquired the Orwellian inverted connotation of words like liberal, tolerant, and diverse. More Orwell comes to mind: “Some ideas are so stupid, only an intellectual would believe them.”
Buckley’s line about preferring to be governed by the first thousand names in the Boston phonebook than the faculty of Harvard is truer now than it was when he said it.
Yeah, and we can be certain the "Elites" will have plenty of gas, plenty of steak, and all the electrons they can consume
Dear Elites:
Mind your own fucking business.
Freedom is the reason the U.S. was established. Don't like it? There are lots of other countries with much less of it. You are welcome to relocate there. Don't let the door hit you in the ass on your way out.
Yours Truly,
The Deplorables
What is most interesting about this story (you can read the whole there here: https://archive.ph/sKHQt ) is that, amidst all this fascinating statistical data, Strassel steadfastly avoids giving us the number we would most like to have: How big a slice of the population does this Elite represent? Is it 20%? 10%? 2%? Who are these people that have such a disproportionate grip on public policy-making and guiding social-commentary?
They don't think we should even have the freedom to speak.
The is a powerful example of why I'm voting for Trump. Everybody knows on which side of this divide both Trump and Biden reside.
Once again, the gift of Trump is that these elites have crawled out from under their rocks to bleat their destructive ideas. Unfortunately, the people who reject their lunacy do not all vote accordingly.
A number of the elite, including some of our family members, inexplicably just go along with the bullshit and refuse to discuss it.
A parallel is the emerging global jihad which, if successful, will make all the rest irrelevant. People don't want to name it.
We offer you bennies for babies... fetuses, to relieve your "burdens"... uh, burdens, and still you are ungrateful, deplorables. Let them take a knee, beg, roll over...
Haughtiness is adjacent to one of the seven deadly sins.
Those danged Deplorables just don't know what's good for them. And as an Elite, I'm going to give it to them---Good and Hard.
What can I say--that's the mantra of the Biden-Kerry-Clinton-Pelosi-Schiff crowd.
As a Deplorable, my reply to these clowns is "Sod Off Swamp Critter".
Eat the Rich.
Of course the elites who want to RULE us think we have too much individual freedom. If you haven't noticed, they are trying to force us how to think, and going after people for NOT thinking like they do. Slaves on a plantation is what they are trying to force us to be.
The “elites” seem to be very short-sighted, and unaware of their actual, physical vulnerability if they continue shitting on “everyone else.”
- Rafe
If the individual in a society has no freedom then neither does the society as a whole.
"Nearly 50% of elites believe the U.S. provides 'too much individual freedom' — compared with nearly 60% of voters who believe there is too much 'government control.'"
Which suggests that the 50% within the smaller elite group has outsize influence even among other elites as well.
I'm sure a Venn diagram would help!
Our elites are of two camps:
Those who feel like we should ship the jobs making things, the jobs that give many people satisfaction and pay well, to China. A man working in a factory likes to look at the loading dock where the stuff he spent the day making is finished and ready to be shipped, but the elites. in this camp feel that this guy's highest use is flipping burgers, or riding a lawnmower. These are the people who call good paying jobs in any field but their own "economic inefficiency." Or we should flood the US with cheap labor, to keep our workforce at a disadvantage, and always a little hungry for jobs. Even those jobs riding a mower should be a little hard to get.
Then there is the second camp, these are the people that feel like we should send our sons across the oceans to fight wars to enforce the economic primacy of the United States, which, of course, mainly benefits the elites.
The Trump voter sees it this way, either they ship my job off to China, or they take my son, and ship him off to China on a troop carrier. None of these elites give a rip what is best for American non elites. Of course they call the points I am making symptoms of a false consciousness. I have been deceived by a demagogue, apparently.
It's interesting to note that after the Black Plague in Europe, wages for working people rose due to scarcity. But they assume that if working people in the United States oppose immigration, it can only be because they hate brown people. One X wag put it like this 'Trumpers would rather be poor than be around brown people" The idea being that immigration increases prosperity, which is does —for the elite, and for the owning classes in general.
Was it in the Great Gatsby that there was a guy who built himself a large manse on a hill, and tried to pay all of his neighbors to thatch their roofs? Fitzgerald noted that they refused, as good Americans. Now their refusal would be seen as a kind of low grade insurrection. For all the Marxist learning about class interests, it's kind of amazing that elites seem unable to understand that they are using their power to maximize benefits for themselves, as a class, harming those that they view as entrusted to their care.
The elites feel safe behind their massive walls of money that buys them power and freedom to demand the extermination of those 7 billion sub humans that pollute their Goddess Gaia’s planet.
If that’s not a religious cult, I don’t know what one is. For sure it’s not science.
I noticed what @Aggie noticed with the article. How many people are in this elite oligarchy? What percentage of the total US population purports to rule the rest of us?
Hey, no problem!
1: Eliminate all private plane flights
2: Eliminate international business class and above travel. You want to fly someplace, you get in a coach seat. Period. Doesn't matter how much you're willing to pay
3: End all gov't supported travel. That means no flights to conferences paid for by the government. Ever.
Not out of grant money. Not out of gov't contracts. No reimbursement for personally paid. No salary increases.
They want less individual freedom, that's fine. We'll start with them
"We have a democracy."
This is where the GIF of that pretty girl spitting her drink all over and bending over laughing would be good.
This difference is largely due to the difference in wealth. The rich elite will always have access to as much meat, air travel, personal transportation, etc. as they want.
Freedom (or, more accurately, liberty) and the need to build consensus make governing more difficult.
Most elite are highly intelligent (which isn't the same as smart, but don't kid yourself, they are intelligent) and once they believe they've identified a problem and solution, the rest is a burdensome annoyance.
The Founders knew this and crafted protections from highly intelligent elite, because they were themselves elite.
The common thread is too much wind
Too much, shut it down. Too little, shut it down. Just right, intermittently... is a tale of the three Greens and environmental blight.
"Inessential air travel" = any non elite wanting to move around, as opposed to "essential air travel," = whenever an elite wants to fly in zir private jet.
Air travel open to all simply encourages the lower classes to move about. Lord Wellington warned about this back in the railroad days. "Wellington spent the remainder of his life implacably opposed to railways, complaining that they would "encourage the lower classes to travel about".[161]"
It should be no secret that many of our elites admire the PRC and would like emulate their population control measures.
The article is behind a paywall so I don’t know — how is “elite” defined? I assume I’m not in the elite because I think limits on freedom should be applied very, very carefully and sparingly. And I thought Carter’s efforts to ration gasoline were ridiculous. I can’t imagine these chuckleheads doing even as well, much less better.
Ever since Anthropogenic Global Warming raised its head people with expertise in mathematical modeling — such as myself — have been warning that it was all junk science. It’s looking as though we’re starting to get through to you, Professor. Thank you.
With a few notable exceptions the elite always favored greater control over their serfs and less freedom lest the unwashed soil their brocades, and so the more recent crop of Macaronis regress toward the mean. How unexpected.
John Kerry’s rage against the journalist who dared to ask him about his carbon footprint says everything that needs to be said.
As Thomas Sowell so aptly explained, it's all just A Conflict of Visions
"I firmly believe that thousands of Americans will have to die before this Net Zero craziness is stopped. "
I think it will be millions. Seriously.
"Nearly 50% of elites believe the U.S. provides 'too much individual freedom'"
Actually, I agree--too much individual freedom to sleep in tents on public streeets, to rob stores with impunity, and to walk across the border without sanction.
Haughty elites vs uppity average people.
"I firmly believe that thousands of Americans will have to die before this Net Zero craziness is stopped. "
And yet, you've stated you're voting for Kennedy in the general.
Unnecessary air travel. Wouldn't that be almost all of it?
Who gets to decide if it's necessary?
"How annoying that they have to
Fight elections for their cause
The inconvenience having to get a majority
If normal methods of persuasion
Fail to bring them applause
There are other ways of establishing authority." - Evita, Tim Rice
Elite. They keep using that word, but it doesn't mean what they think it means. They may have been able to acquire a fancy Ivy League diploma, but given grade inflation, it doesn't prove they actually know very much. Go ahead, "Elite", and keep crapping on the people who make your comfortable live possible. Perhaps one day soon, you'll find out they need you much less than you need them. Elite - tastes like pork from what I've read.
I've known people like this...sometimes they are truly snobs, sometimes truly clueless because nothing really affects them, and sometimes it's a combination of both.
I was once talking to a fellow soccer dad that I had known for a few years about what I can't remember. He was a very successful stock broker, lived in a massive home in a gated country club, drove fancy cars, etc.
He started a sentence with, 'There was one time that our maid...'
Apparently he grew up with maids, housekeepers, and his father often used a driver.
He wasn't a bad guy. He donated money. He was funny. But he could not handle it if anyone thought he was wrong.
I'm sure he never knew the wonders of powdered milk and day-old bread...
that's rationing for YOU not them. Afterall, they have places to go in their private jets.
I can’t read the article, but who decides who is “elite”?
Who are these Elite people anyway?
What makes them Elite?
These so-called "elites" are not just misguided, they are evil. They are the enemy, and they are winning.
It is worth keeping in mind, that the most important, most valuable intangible asset that any member of the elite possesses, is their sense of entitled, selective anonymity. Anonymity is something that can be taken, usually without fear of prosecution.
The "elites" lament their lost status of a century ago
This business of petty inconvenience and indignity, of being kept waiting about, of having to do everything at other people's convenience, is inherent in working-class life. A thousand influences constantly press a working man down into * passive role. He does not act, he is acted upon. He feels himself the slave of mysterious authority and has a firm conviction that " they " will never allow him to do this, that and the other. Once when I was hop-picking I asked the sweated pickers (they earn something under sixpence an hour) why they did not form a union. I was told immediately that " they " would never allow it. Who were " they " ? I asked. Nobody seemed to know; but evidently " they " were omnipotent.
A person of bourgeois origin goes through life with some expectation of getting what he wants, within reasonable limits. Hence the fact that in times of stress "educated " people tend to come to the front; they are no more gifted than the others and their " education " is generally quite useless in itself, but they are accustomed to a certain amount of deference and consequently have the cheek necessary to a commander.--George Orwell, 'Road to Wigan Pier'
Overcome the conditioning and don't wait for someone who can pronounce the 'aitches' to lead. The college edumedicated are lost to us. They've been on their knees too long.
Elites are the [mortal] gods and priests in secular religions, who grant indulgences, sanctions rites, and hold back the rising waters caused by [catastrophic] [anthropogenic] climate change.
I don't believe this "survey". What do they count as "elite", and where did they find them? How many did they even find?
This reads like another narrative-first-reporting-after column.
Not meaning to be confrontational, but I wonder if this is enough for our hostess to see what's at stake in this election?
Original Mike.
Not voting for Bobby. I will vote GOP.
I’ll never vote for another Dem.
Go to: committeetounleashprosperity.com to see the poll.
Elites throughout history have always lamented (and taken steps to prevent) "too much individual freedom" to the unwashed multitudes.
"Who are these Elite people anyway?
What makes them Elite?"
1. Those with money (and the power that comes with it).
2. Money (and the power that comes with it).
Les aristocrates à la lanterne!
(just sayin')
We will fight the elites, scratching and clawing all the way down.
That's about it. If I could roll all of the 2024 election issues into a single word, then that word would be, "freedom."
"Everybody knows on which side of (the) divide both Trump and Biden reside."
Yes: the elites.
Oh? You still think a man notorious for decades for stiffing his contractors (working people) and who passed tax cuts that predominantly benefit corporate entities and leaves the long-term harm and burden of the resulting lost tax revenues on working people an "enemy of the elites?"
It is to laugh. And vomit.
Sorry, Dave. I guess I misunderstood.
"Too much individual freedom"
Come and take it.
the Simple Solution is..
all that stuff that the elites want banned? Let's Just BAN it, for all the elites..
if That doesn't cure concerns about climate change.. Let's try turning ALL the elites into plant food
Lance said...
I don't believe this "survey". What do they count as "elite", and where did they find them?
Why not just read the damn article? Then you would know the answer to these questions. It is that simple. Try https:archive.is to bypass the paywalls.
Why do so many people post merely to say that they haven't read the article and wonder what it is saying? Wonder no more halfwits! The answer can be yours!
Seriously..
What would be the long term downsides.. To the planet? To the human race? If we executed the top 1%?
"Seventy-seven percent of elites support 'strict rationing of gas, meat, and electricity' to fight climate change". Some key words are missing: "For everyone else"
"Nearly 50% of elites believe the U.S. provides 'too much individual freedom'". Again, those key words are missing: "For everyone else"
It's like these people thought Animal Farm was a how-to guide.
Should they both end up as the candidates, citing this survey/poll and asking where each of them stands on some of these questions (more/less freedom, ration food, gas, etc.) would make a fascinating debate question.
who are this "elites"?
The survey is a first-of-its-kind look at the views of the American Elite – defined as people having at least one
post-graduate degree, earning at least $150,000 annually, and living in high-population density areas (more
than 10,000 people per square mile in their zip code) – and compares them to what the average American
thinks. The Elites represent 1% of the U.S. population
Seriously.. They look like plant food to me
Not surprisingly, these people talk about politics
far more than most Americans. The data show that nearly a third of them (30%) talk about politics daily or
almost every day. Just 9% of the voting public do. It is worth noting that members of the Elites who talk
about politics daily have views that are even further removed from the opinions of the voting public.
This is true even when the Elites self-identify as Republicans. They typically may be more conservative than
Elite Democrats but they still have attitudes and opinions that are far removed from those of the typical
American voter. The Elite class – regardless of party – is an exclusive club that sees and experiences America
through a different lens than ordinary Americans.
These results confirm what people have long suspected: today, there are two Americas.
Can't speak for "elite" women, but I'm pretty sure "elite" men say that stuff to get laid.
These are the same "laptop class" who saw lockdowns as no big deal (I remember a certain communi- er, commenter asking, obtusely, "What freedoms did anyone lose?") because THEY can just sit in a house and have people bring them stuff, having no idea that their electrical power would fail within 48 hours if people weren't working the power plants and the grid, that their huddling in self-righteous terror meant that delivery drivers and grocery store shelf-stockers were ineligible for covid checks but were interacting with 100s of people per day and being given mandatory overtime, etc., etc., etc.
THESE PEOPLE NEED TO GET OUT OF THEIR BUBBLE.
The military draft was an unfairly implemented, freedom-sucking exploitation of the young by the older (Just like the covid lockdowns. Hmmmm), but it at least provided some fraction of the "elite" a little education about the physical labor necessary to keep the lights on, food on the table, collect garbage, etc. Now? It seems that a considerable fraction of the "laptop class" has absolutely no idea how the world actually works. I don't WANT a return to the draft, but how the hell do we re-educate these idiots? They are going to get people killed.
Not just hyperbole: if you've coerced everyone into switching over to electric heat pumps and then the unstable grid goes down in a northeaster, old people who trusted the authorities' assurances that everything would be fine (and who, even if they didn't, probably don't have the physical strength to haul a generator out of storage and get it running, much less get fuel for it when the outside temperature is in the teens) are going to freeze to death.
Two old concepts:
1. Hegemony -- those in power do anything to stay in power. Power corrupts.
2. Chess pawns are expendable.
History is rhyming with its past bigtime. The upper 1% fought off its last challenge from the left (the Occupy Wall St. and Bernie Bros of 2015) by exploiting Trump Derangement Syndrome and Biden's bribes.
The looming "people's revolution" era will be interesting, as the wealthy might create any sort of bio terror or technology terror tool they desire. Living in interesting times.
Immigration, regulatory environment, energy production, censorship; sorry, Robert, it's going to take more than a white paper from Brookings to dissuade me. Is Trump a billionaire, and therefore "elite"? Sure. But he's on the side of freedom and lifting all boats.
And as for this: "The massive corporate tax cut is costing more than expected and not trickling down to workers."
The Trump economy was the first in a long time to see substantial gains by the working class.
The trouble with freedom is always someone else's exercise of it. So the elites who feel their freedom is safe, want less for others, because those others bother them.
But the trouble with humanity is that we have things like Covid, where the assumed freedom of the elites is broached, they can't handle it, and they panic. And also things like the French Revolution, where it started out as a nice expression of human freedom, then turned into mass executions of all the elites, and then Napoleon came in, restored French pride through the wholesale slaughter of healthy young men in winning battles all while holding on to his desire to be a new kind of elite.
Oppressed revolt, become the new oppressors. The cycle repeats itself because people really are broken and really want to exert their own presumed will against others. Everyone wants to be god over the others, but no one is able to carry that weight, so the best government systems are cynical at the core in protecting freedoms no matter what anyone feels about them in particular cases.
The worst systems start with an overoptimistic anthropology, undermine freedom almost altogether except for the elites, and then there's always upheaval as people fight to become or fight against whoever the current pool of elites are.
There is a shared hope for oppressed and oppressor in fulfilling community but that comes with understanding the deep brokenness within humanity, understanding the breadth and depth of real freedom, and finding a shared constructive vision of particular places, not generalized society.
"Oh? You still think a man notorious for decades for stiffing his contractors (working people) and who passed tax cuts that predominantly benefit corporate entities and leaves the long-term harm and burden of the resulting lost tax revenues on working people an enemy of the elites?"
So, in your view (and I'm not, at the moment, arguing that you're wrong), it's a choice between a candidate who openly serves the elites and a lying pseudo populist. Since I only get two options, I'll still pick the guy who's at least pretending to care about the people, if only to "send a message". Trump is, if nothing else, the "Giant Middle Finger" candidate.
Elites support a strong restrictive federal government because they know they can secure the exemptions they need to live their lives however they want.
They're already working on the virus. It might even be ready.
People that have strong opinions about stuff they have never given 20 seconds of to.
All of the things they mentioned, need to be preferenced with. "When I am King of World"
You're allowed to have an opinion about not driving ICE autos. What you are not allowed to do is make that decision for others.
It is very scary that anyone under 50 has no concept of the Constitution. Its structure and purpose.
This all ties into the Chevron review before SCOTUS now.
The Nation can not ban for example, ICE vehicles by bypassing Congress.
They would, wouldn’t they.
"More than two-thirds of elite Ivy graduates favor banning things like gasoline-powered cars and stoves and inessential air travel in the name of the environment."
How many climate crises have been predicted over the last 50 years? 50? 100? More? How many of those predictions have been accurate? None. The idea that the environment is at risk and that Top Men know how to fix things is a no more than a belief in the god of Computer Models.
Nothing is stopping that two-thirds from forgoing ICEs and air travel, if that's what their religion demands. They don't, however, get to force that religion on others, not that that will stop them from trying. Seems they're pushing awfully hard to get to FAFO. I suspect a lot of them will be disappointed with how the "FO" part goes for them.
More than 70% of average voters say they'd be unwilling to pay more than $100 a year in taxes or costs for climate -- compared with 70% of elites who said they'd pay from $250 up to 'whatever it takes.'...
Now let's do it in percentage or total worth, assholes.
The little old lady on SocSec donating $1 to SA on Christmas is doing a helluva lot more than a friggin' millionaire giving $1000 to a favored charity.
Looking at the criteria and the methodology I'd say that despite the involvement of Scott Rasmussen this poll should be considered a work of fiction.
That doesn't necessarily mean it is incorrect.
By that definition, my wife and I are elite. I won't speak for her, but I am more like Begley. But, nobody asked me my opinion.
Another algorithm generated crack bait headline to get your epinephrine spiked so you'll order the comfort of a super sized happy meal delivered by grub dash eats to solidify your future ozempic demand. Hello Fresh Meat. Welcome to the Machine.
"Seventy-seven percent of elites support 'strict rationing of gas, meat, and electricity' to fight climate change, vs. 28% of everyone else." That should scare everyone, more than any other single polling result. When you look at the constant recourse to apocalyptic climate language by Gore, Kerry and Biden, it isn't that hard to imagine declaring a climate emergency requiring just such steps (relying of course on COVID precedent). Is there any doubt that Democrat majorities in the Senate and House would go along?
I've heard people argue in all seriousness that free speech about global warming or pandemics should be suppressed even when the criticism is 100% correct, on the grounds that it undermines public support for all the other science that is (allegedly) true. They believe that no criticism of a scientist by anyone except another scientist in the same field should ever be tolerated.
A man working in a factory likes to look at the loading dock where the stuff he spent the day making is finished and ready to be shipped, but the elites in this camp feel that this guy's highest use is flipping burgers, or riding a lawnmower.
I disagree. Burger flipping and lawnmower riding are what illegal aliens are for, to this crowd. The rest of us are supposed to be on Universal Basic Income, voting for the permanent aggrandizement of government, and sitting on the sofa smoking weed and playing video games and watching TikTok as the blood drips from the gaping wound where our genitals used to be.
Why not just read the damn article? Then you would know the answer to these questions. It is that simple. Try https:archive.is to bypass the paywalls.
Paywall bypassing is theft. I don't thieve. If you'd be willing to share a link to the poll itself, that'd be great (assuming it's not also paywalled).
I'm curious: Commenters regularly post without reading the article, why did you select my comment for a response?
"Nearly 50% of elites believe the U.S. provides 'too much individual freedom' — compared with nearly 60% of voters who believe there is too much 'government control.'"
That's a pretty small delta if you ask me. If it's 50-50 for tyranny among the elites, and only 57-43% for freedom among the rest of us, then another 10 years of importing Latin American and Chinese peasants at Biden-era levels will be the end of liberty.
That "lost tax revenue," which is what liberals call take home pay, would not be doing so much "harm" if the Democrats had not passed trillions of dollars in spending on nonsense like EVs and "stimulus" packages designed to get them re-elected by going to key constituencies, not the nation as a whole.
I think that Trump got played on the tax cuts, this was Paul Ryan selling out Trump voters, by prioritizing his tax cuts over the wall, but still, the biggest percentage tax cuts went to the bottom end of the income scale. This is not even up for debate.
Most elite are highly intelligent (which isn't the same as smart, but don't kid yourself, they are intelligent) and once they believe they've identified a problem and solution, the rest is a burdensome annoyance.
There's a great quote from Hayek regarding the "knowledge problem" that I wish I could find. He says something most of us here know to be true: the surest way to tyranny is to allow all the leading experts in every field to have free rein to mandate their most cherished ideals. He goes on to point out the irony that despite all the unfettered tyranny, the results would not be nearly as rational and perfected as the elite experts might fancy, and in fact it would turn out to be even more dysfunctional and irrational than law-of-the-jungle anarchy.
In other words, "So, Mr. Stalin, may I see the omelette?"
Commies love to micromanage and control others.
Did I say Commies? I meant "elites" .
Why consider yourself elite if you can't rule over the underlings so perhaps we should be surprised the percentage isn't higher. To be honest, I'm happy to pay a little extra in taxes for a little extra policing such that I can walk into my local corner pharmacy and purchase items on the shelf, yet that restricts the individual freedom of just taking the item off the shelf and walking out the door without paying.
This level of disconnect leads to guillotines.
the ELites are always OK with restrictions and rationing of goods because it doesnt effect them. If tommorrow we got rid of gas cars and beef prices went up 400 percent, the elite wouldn't care, because the price of beef is irrelevent to them. They can afford it at almost any price. And they can always find a way around any restriction.
Do you really think rich people didn't find a way to Hawaii when the rest of couldn't go? Or they were hurt when the Covoid restrictions came in? They found a way around them. If they wanted.
Its like WW I or WW II. If you were average Joe, you got drafted and put in danger. If you were Rich, you didn't fight unless you wanted to. Well, the "elite" aren't going to hurt by climate change restrictions. That's why they fight for them so hard.
@Greg the Class Traitor: Hey, no problem!
1: Eliminate all private plane flights
2: Eliminate international business class and above travel. You want to fly someplace, you get in a coach seat. Period. Doesn't matter how much you're willing to pay ...
I would add 1.5: It's the Full TSA treatment, all the time.
@Dave Begley: I firmly believe that thousands of Americans will have to die before this Net Zero craziness is stopped.
Green Leap Forward.
@Rita: As Thomas Sowell so aptly explained, it's all just A Conflict of Visions
A truly brilliant book.
@Left Bank of the Charles: It’s not just EVs.. Many factory parking lots in Minnesota have long had plugins for block heaters.
For any car built in the last, oh, twenty years, those block heaters are (outside *extremely* low temperatures) unnecessary.
Why?
Modern engines specify oil viscosity 0W-20, instead of something like 30W-50 back in the day. The viscosity of 0W-20 flows nearly as well at -20º F as it does at 32º F, unlike 30W-fill in the blank. (The "W" refers to Winter, i.e., cold weather behavior.)
Howard said...
"Another algorithm generated crack bait headline to get your epinephrine spiked so you'll order the comfort of a super sized happy meal delivered by grub dash eats to solidify your future ozempic demand. Hello Fresh Meat. Welcome to the Machine."
Dude. Your life sucks.
Dave Begley said...
“We have a democracy.”
Ben Franklin responded…
“ A Republic, If You Can Keep It”
130 day EV inventory on dealer lots.
Rental giant Hertz dumps EVs, including Teslas, for gas cars
Jan 11 (Reuters) - Rental firm Hertz Global Holdings (HTZ.O), opens new tab is selling about 20,000 electric vehicles, including Teslas, from its U.S. fleet about two years after a deal with the automaker to offer its vehicles for rent, in another sign that EV demand has cooled.
Hertz will instead opt for gas-powered vehicles, it said on Thursday, citing higher expenses related to collision and damage for EVs even though it had aimed to convert 25% of its fleet to electric by 2024 end.
@PB: interestingly, most small plane crashes are due to running out of fuel so being able to fly a plane doesn't necessarily make you that smart.
Wrong. Here are the top five cause:
1. Loss of Control in Flight
2. Controlled Flight into Terrain
3. Systems Failures
4. Low Altitude Operations
5. Undetermined. (Which are almost certainly one of the above four, but without enough evidence to know.)
Some fun with EV numbers:
Roughly speaking, an EV weighs about 1,000 pounds more than its ICE counterpart. Assume a multi-story car park with 500 spaces. Is that car park structurally sound with 500,000 pounds more loaded on it?
What is the impact on roads when all cars weigh 1,000 pounds more? (Never mind that EV's aren't paying any road taxes, even though paying per KwH would be easily done.)
EVs cost about 10% more than their ICE counterparts. ICE operating costs aren't nearly enough higher to make up the difference.
The IEEE did an extensive article on what is involved transitioning to EVs.. It was written by someone who is clearly in the tank for EV's. Just one of many negative observations: Distribution level transformers (the final step-down, they supply power to 15-30 households) have a service life of 25 years, give or take, based upon their customary duty cycle.. When their duty cycle is extended due to overnight charging, that service life drops by 90%. We are talking about millions of these things.
A typical interstate service plaza has 16 refueling points. Five minutes at the pump gets around 400 miles of range. Fast chargers will provide 200 miles in about 30 minutes. In order to have the same availability, in an EC world, those plazas would need 192 charge points. And that is ignoring that fast charging to 100% and discharging to near zero seriously reduces battery life.
In communism's finest tradition, the Green Leap Forward devotees are bound and determined to force us into something distinctly inferior to what we already have.
How's the gout, Rusty?
Howard said...
"How's the gout, Rusty?"
All gone. Thanks fer askin'
i posted this before, but blogger ate my link..
https://committeetounleashprosperity.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/Them-vs-Us_CTUP-Rasmussen-Study-FINAL.pdf
I don't mind people not reading the assignments, for whatever reasons..
My beef is when people say: I didn't read this paper.. But it MUST be wrong!
If you don't want to pay for a subscription to WSJ (i do)..
and you don't want to go to the public library (i have)..
Then IF you don't believe something; please don't Brag about your ignorance..
Let's pick on someone.. At Random:
Lance said...
I don't believe this "survey". What do they count as "elite", and where did they find them? How many did they even find?
Lance, it's GREAT, that you are an ignorant lazy cheapskate.. But please quit bragging about it
I fully support things that (in my limited, likely mistaken view) would adversely affect others while leaving me alone or (even better) advantaged.
I'm shocked, shocked to find there is gambling at Ricks.
And I'll have to re-read how "intellectuals" fared in past application of these viewpoints. (Killing fields, Stalin, Mao?) My memory is not what it used to be. So perhaps the re-education camps, erasures or executions did not really happen.
“The IEEE did an extensive article on what is involved transitioning to EVs.. It was written by someone who is clearly in the tank for EV's. “
Very cynical there. Maybe 15 years ago, I was on IEEE-USA government relations council, as the chair of their Intellectual Property Committee. Good friend got me the IPC post and chaired the meetings as the VP of Govt Relations. We did most of the work setting public policy for IEEE-USA. You pretty much had to get GRC approval before proposed policy positions went to the Board. About half the proposed policy statements had some sort of Global Warming hook. I objected every time, and usually got it removed (since they didn’t want me writing a dissent for the Board), on the grounds that it was too political for the organization. That friend of mine and I ultimately left office, and GRC policy statements started using the CAGW hook. And now, Spectrum, the Institute’s general publication for its membership, is invariably filled with articles using CAGW/Climate Change as a hook. Of course, most of the researchers, at least, qualify as “Elites” (see Ann’s post 1/19@9:42 AM), with their graduate degrees, international travel, etc, so their adherence to this Climate religion is almost mandatory.
There's a significant number of us who believe we have both: Too much gov't bureaucratic control AND too much individual freedom from responsibility for your actions.
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